Pro-Tip: How Not to Fire a 12 Gauge Pistol or Sawed-Off Shotgun

Click here for a short video on how not to fire a 12 gauge pistol/sawed-off shotgun. The video shows the shooting firing with a less than firm grip on the firearm. Shotguns cartridges can develop considerable recoil. Without a firm grip, and only using one hand, the firearm flies out of the shooter’s hand and smacks him in the face.

It could have been worse. Occasionally a shooter with a weak grip will find that the firearm escapes his grasp while the trigger finger stays engaged. The firearm then may fire one or more shots as it flips around. In a small number of cases, it leads to the shooter’s demise.

You can see that this shooter is inexperienced and fearful by the body posture. He leans back away from the gun, attempting to put his body as far from it as possible. This moves his center of gravity back toward the edge of his base of support, making it easy for him to be tipped off balance to the rear.

Experienced shooters lean into the gun, so that recoil moves them onto their base instead of off of it. With a firearm with significant recoil, use two hands to help control it. This is especially worthwhile if you haven’t fired it before, and don’t know how much recoil will be generated.

Once you experience the recoil, you will have an idea of what to expect, and what might be necessary to control it. Be wary of others who have fired guns and then give them to you to “try” if they may have significant recoil.

It is not unknown for pranksters to fire a gun with reduced loads, then to hand it to the unwary with full power loads. This is a very bad practice, but it happens. Some people like to play “practical jokes.” It’s a deadly serious matter when firearms are involved.

Well, I _have_ fired a 20 gauge pistol, namely a replica howdah pistol. A .44 Mag revolver has next to no recoil compared to that black powder beast. A full load, designed to give one a fighting chance against a charging tiger, actually gave me a bleeding bruise once when my one-handed grip was too weak.